


On Broken Hearts and Broken Bricks

by IneffableAlien



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, BAMF Aziraphale (Good Omens), BAMF Crowley (Good Omens), Bittersweet Ending, Crowley Has Self-Esteem Issues (Good Omens), Gay Pride, Genderfluid Crowley (Good Omens), Genderqueer Crowley (Good Omens), Ineffable Idiots (Good Omens), LGBTQ Themes, M/M, Miscommunication, Non-Graphic Violence, Oblivious Aziraphale (Good Omens), Pining Crowley (Good Omens), Police Brutality, Stonewall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-06
Updated: 2019-10-06
Packaged: 2020-11-26 04:33:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20924228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IneffableAlien/pseuds/IneffableAlien
Summary: It was, of course, 1960s America, and police raids were nothing new at the Stonewall Inn.  Nobody ever expected a warrant.What they had come to expect, though, was a tipoff.June 28, 1969 would be different.Crowley leaves London in 1967 to clear his head for a couple years.  He is very good at being in the wrong place at the right time.





	On Broken Hearts and Broken Bricks

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LadyNorbert](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyNorbert/gifts).

> EDIT: Gifted to my sister a month after I posted it, for encouraging me to write fanfiction.
> 
> I haven't written fanfic in about twenty years, but I couldn't stop thinking about Crowley and Aziraphale at the Stonewall riots.
> 
> Non-con warning is listed for aggressive police searching (including full strips), potential for dysphoria from reading.

A lot can happen in two years.

It’s a blip in the grand scheme of things, but even a certain supernatural entity with multiple millennia under his snakeskin belt knows that time doesn’t always move the same way, all … marching forward and in a straight line, at a steady pace. No, time is more like a deck of cards, constantly being shuffled back and forth, and maybe the dealer is actually a pretty lousy shuffler, and so every now and then the whole thing shoots out onto the floor and has to be picked up, slowly and searchingly, one card at a time.

Right now, Crowley is the Joker card that got lost under the couch, never to be shuffled out of stasis until the inhabitants of this longwinded metaphor move out of the flat.

So, much in the same way that a person going through an awful breakup suddenly needs a questionable haircut, Crowley decided in 1967 that London’s Soho was just no longer doing it for him, and that furthermore this had absolutely nothing to do with a certain angel or a certain bookshop that a certain passive-aggressive Bentley kept insisting on passing en route to anywhere.

Nope, completely unrelated.

Tired of the scene, tired of the same old corrupt souls, and, quite frankly, tired of the friendly young barfly with the unfortunate dental problem who kept calling him at all hours of the night for song ideas (he was trying to start a rock band), Crowley decided that it was time to explore the United States. A country so improbably vast compared to England, with so many different types of people to tempt, was just the ticket to escaping absolutely anything that even remotely reminded him of Soho.

So naturally he moved to Manhattan.

To be fair, although he predictably arrived in SoHo, Crowley immediately found himself gravitating toward Greenwich Village. At least he was making some effort.1

Crowley liked the Village a great deal. He found himself drawn to its many gay bars, fabulous little dens of iniquity that they were. (To be clear on Heaven and Hell’s stance on this, the sinfulness of these places actually had nothing to do with homosexuality. It had a lot more to do with it being New York.) People always believed he was Mafia anyway—as were most of the owners of those types of bars—and so he even briefly entertained the notion of opening up a club of his own.2

He also felt it was a justifiable move professionally. Not only was he surrounded by debauchery, something that smelled a lot like revolution seemed to be in the air as well. Civil unrest always resulted in some right (er—wrong, rather) sinning. Crowley could probably earn himself a commendation, just drinking and waiting.

In the meantime, he could work on making his drag makeup a little less terrible.

—  
It was, of course, 1960s America, and police raids were nothing new at the Stonewall Inn. Nobody ever expected a warrant.

What they had come to expect, though, was a tipoff.

June 28, 1969 would be different.

—  
Everything happened much too fast.

The undercover police entered the Stonewall and promptly started rounding up any patron wearing what was under the law considered female garb, jostling them into the restroom to be stripped and have their genitalia checked. Everyone else was frisked where they stood. Nobody missed that perceived lesbians were gripped up a little (a lot) rougher than the rest. The cacophony of barked orders, screaming bar-goers, and chairs flipping rose up like hellfire.

The crowd appeared to be growing exponentially. Supporters of the gay bar were filtering in from surrounding locations. If someone had simply wanted to escape before the police barred the doors, they likely would have found themself shoulder-to-shoulder and barely able to move. That continued to be the case even as police tried to forcefully remove individuals from the front of the bar.

Crowley found himself wondering, as he usually did in times like these, if this wasn’t somehow his fault.

As the crowd started to openly taunt the police (_“Pigs, pigs, pigs”_), more NYPD swarmed, and Crowley vibrated from having his demonic essence inundated by the growing wrath on all sides.

Earlier it was alluded that Crowley had initiated a light hobby of drag. What appealed to him most was that he could play with outrageous fashions and styles, while maintaining the shape of his corporation that he liked best. Best of both worlds, really. Of course, he could technically always do that, but part of coexisting with humans while being a demon was choosing not to draw a lot of attention to himself. The bar had felt like a fun place for him to let that guard down.

Crowley felt sick. He had never been a fighter, but his moral compass had always failed to properly point due south. He did not like any of the possible options that occurred to him.

A butch lesbian at the front of the bar, blinded by her own blood, had thrown the first retaliatory punch. Then, struggling in handcuffs, she screamed at her peers for all to hear: _“Why don’t you guys do something?”_

All hell broke loose.

The crowd was bursting with chants of “Gay power,” and people were shoving and screaming the whole way. Suddenly, a beer can bounced off a cop’s head, and from then on the air was thick with flying debris. Police response had escalated from manhandling, to flat-out brutality. Crowley watched an officer’s arm swing down with the force of a baton, but realized it was actually a purse.

He was beating a man with his own purse.

Crowley could not have explained if asked why, in the midst of so much fighting, that was the image that was going to haunt him.

The way he saw things now, Crowley should have either miracled himself out of the situation, or miracled his appearance—whether a change in clothes, or (more difficult to do but easier to conceal in a crowd) shifting his shape to match what he was wearing.

Changing his appearance was moot now, because nobody was checking underwear before kicking in heads anymore.

The first choice was desertion, and he didn’t like the taste that left in his mouth.3

The arrow of Crowley’s moral compass groaned.

Because unfortunately for Crowley, the humans who frequented the Stonewall had really grown on him. He was a terrible demon that way. He knew their names, their hopes, their fears. He knew who walked the streets at night to save up for transition, and he knew who did the greatest Cher impression. Hell, he was pretty sure the butch lesbian who had thrown the first punch tonight had bought him a 7 and 7 once (the comedy of the drink’s name did not escape him). And they knew him, too, kind of. As well as a handful of human drinking buddies _could_ know him, anyway.

Gashes from baton strikes crossed painted faces. Handcuffed people were intentionally left alone out in the open and defenseless. Sobbing openly was a beautiful homeless youth who had analyzed Dylan lyrics out loud to Crowley one night while he hiccuped into his drink. Artists, rebels, and seekers of knowledge were falling all around him.

Crowley suddenly felt like he was choking, as if he had taken too big a bite out of an apple.

Naturally, Crowley _felt_ Aziraphale before he saw him. The starburst in his chest that pulsed whenever he came near, which couldn’t possibly be love, he’s a demon, dammit, blasted him from within like metaphysical wings that ripped apart the sky while an angel miracled his way into the room. Which, of course, is literally what just happened.

_No,_ thought Crowley, _not here, not right now._

The inn had turned into a war zone, and the last time Crowley saw Aziraphale, Aziraphale was running out of Crowley’s car to get away from him.

Aziraphale appeared directly behind him, and grabbed him by the shoulder to spin him around when he realized. “Crowley!” he shouted over the din. “What are you doing here??”

Aziraphale had finally come to comprehend and appreciate Crowley so much more, light years more, just over the last three decades, but Crowley had six thousand years’ worth of tiny cuts to close, so when Aziraphale asked him what he was doing in the middle of the Stonewall riots, what Crowley _translated_ was, _Did_ you _do this?_ “Nice to see you, too,” Crowley pretended to joke, but the corners of his mouth set wretchedly.

“I knew I had a blessing to perform here but Upstairs utterly neglected to communicate the severity of the situation,” Aziraphale said miserably.4 The fires at Stonewall were just starting now, and small flames could be seen flickering from the trashcans out front.

Crowley failed to pay attention to the fact that Aziraphale was _explaining_ himself, almost as though he felt guilty for not rushing in sooner and valued Crowley’s opinion of him.5 But since Crowley had already assumed that Aziraphale was judging _him_ as guilty, the two were, as usual, not even speaking the same blessed language.

This miscommunication aside, Crowley saw the tears forming in Aziraphale’s wide eyes and softened immediately. He hissed as he breathed in sharply, and he forced himself to look away before he got even more distracted from the dangers around them. Crowley moved so that his back was pressed against Aziraphale’s. “Yeah, uh, situation could definitely be better—look, you miracle that way and I’ve got you over here.”

For a second the air shimmered, and then the bar seemed _bigger_ somehow, although any change was imperceptible. The only thing the humans around them understood was that people who had formerly felt trapped were free to move now. A scruffy group of towering wigs darted past Crowley and managed to escape the front door without so much as a glance from police.

The first brick had been thrown.

A flying brick is a pretty serious bit of weaponry, even if it isn’t shot from a Witchfinder Lieutenant’s thundergun.

“Good heavens!” Aziraphale cried, ducking just in time to save his corporation’s scalp. “Somebody is going to get killed like this!”

The fires outside were climbing taller. Crowley glared at a burning trashcan that was too close to blocking the exit for comfort, and the fire got nervous and wisely shrank down.

“Nobody is going to die at Stonewall, angel,” Crowley said quietly.6 It was a promise. He wasn’t sure if Aziraphale had heard him. It didn’t matter. He felt resolved. He had plenty of demonic tricks up his Yves Saint Laurent blouse sleeve; he would just have to figure out what to put in his reports later. Having Aziraphale at his back now, regardless of however they last left off, had mentally sent him from 0 to 110, speeding past Slough.

Crowley was heavily focused on a few batons that were coincidentally exploding in the hands of those wielding them when he thought he felt the air around him gasp and tighten violently for a moment. A brick grazed an officer’s cheek instead of smashing her directly in the face, and he felt Aziraphale all over it. Crowley spun on him. “There are kids in here—”

“But this is a bar,” Aziraphale interrupted helpfully.

“I know it’s a blasted bar!” Crowley shouted. “We have kids, homeless gay kids, they hang out, don’t stop miracling their way out just to concentrate on one cop—”

“I’m here for _everyone!”_ Aziraphale yelled wildly. He was gesturing and altering the fabric of the size of the bar and its exits as he argued, creating more breathing room again.7 “They are _all_ human, Crowley, and those men and women are ju—”

“Don’t you dare say it!” Crowley roared. The trashcan fires behind him flared up for dramatic effect, then thought better of it and decided they should probably stay out of this one. “Don’t say they’re just doing their bloody job!”

Aziraphale bit his lip and said nothing. What could he say in a time like this? Also, there were connotations to Crowley’s outburst that he really did not wish to explore, not now, not ever.

Crowley settled back into miracling position. He hated that he had just shouted down his best friend, but they were both under pressure and this wasn’t exactly the time to talk things out.8 He knew that Aziraphale would continue to help everyone, every human he could save, regardless of things like “sides” or uniforms or lack thereof, and he also knew that he secretly adored that about him. Aziraphale’s back was warm on his body, and he leaned into it in such a way that he hoped spoke hushed tones of _Thank you for being as kind as you are,_ and _Please stay this time and I’ll go as slow as you want,_ and maybe something else entirely.

All that—the first, but not last, riot at Stonewall—in just 45 minutes.

—  
The Stonewall Inn isn’t recognized as a National Historic Landmark until 2016, and Crowley had made it clear that he wanted to go see the unveiling.9

Crowley stands on Christopher Street and looks up. He is not looking at the inn anymore. He is looking at the neighboring condos. There are crudely drawn posters facing out some of the windows.

Aziraphale and Crowley have seen such terrible events between them—the ark, plagues, world wars. It is painfully obvious that Crowley feels some kind of way about the Stonewall, and Aziraphale treats the subject tenderly and with respect, but privately he does not understand why it affects Crowley as much as it does. They _are_ man-shaped beings, but Aziraphale does not believe that Crowley is so attached to this body that he would feel moved to categorize himself by its parts or what he might do with them—so Aziraphale strongly doubts that Crowley mourns on behalf of the LGBT community, as it were. Perhaps Crowley had some sort of human affair during his time in the Village, and feels wistful about it? Aziraphale is surprised to find that the idea really ruffles his feathers, and he puts it out of his mind.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale starts gently, “can I ask, what was it about this place?” He resists the urge to minimize it, to voice his thinking that he doesn’t fully get what the— what is that expression?— what the large deal is. “Why is it so very special to you?”

Aziraphale tracks Crowley’s gaze, hoping for some clue. It is an unremarkable building, not a luxurious brownstone or anything like that; more than a few of its residents have hung charming little signs and pride flags to celebrate the landmark ceremony. It’s all so delightfully—human.

But none of the windows jump out at him. It’s just a big sea of rainbows. Aziraphale didn’t even think Crowley liked rainbows, after … well, you know.

Crowley is wearing that tight, upside down smile of his that anyone else could easily mistake for a frown, but Aziraphale knows Crowley’s facial expressions better than he knows his own.

“S’not the place that’s special, angel,” Crowley says. He’s been looking at the same sign. It’s nothing flashy, no drawings, no glitter—just five words. Crowley never needs to blink, yet he can’t shake the feeling that there’s something in his eyes.

_Love is not a sin._

—  
1 No, not that sort of effort. Is that all anyone who reads fanfiction thinks about?

2 He didn’t. This isn’t some cinematographic show on Netflix, people.

3 Decades later, when the world doesn’t end, Crowley will desperately try to start up a jeep to abandon a group of humans. And he’ll look like a coward, and he won’t care, because saying he wants to do the demonic thing and save himself will be too much easier than saying, _Aziraphale, we need to go, I need to save_ **you.** But Aziraphale wasn’t in the Stonewall that night, needing his protection, so what did it matter what happened to Crowley? At least, that was how Crowley saw it.

4 Crowley had received a message from Hell that day, too. He had been listening to Joni Mitchell in his apartment, and in the middle of “Both Sides, Now,” she had said tersely, _Tears and fears and feeling proud, to say, ‘CROWLEY, GO TO THE ESTABLISHMENT AT 51-53 CHRISTOPHER STREET TONIGHT AND REMAIN THERE,’ right out loud …_ Crowley had thought it rather nice of them to suggest he take the night off and go grab a drink.

5 Right, Crowley. “Almost.”

6 In an alternate universe where Crowley hadn’t been in the Village that night, Derrick Barry might have been sadly right.

7 Aziraphale was not actually altering the size of the physical bar. He was only altering the size of the empty space in the bar. Think of it like the music of the silence between notes which is inherent to jazz, except nothing like that.

8 He couldn’t process his feelings now. He would have to call his old songwriter friend back in England later to vent.

9 Crowley had “made it clear” by mumbling into his wine glass one night that they were doing a thing with the Stonewall, some American monument thingy, and that if he cared about human history then he’d want to go, but obviously he’s already lived history so it’s not that big a deal, but also if the angel wanted to go then he would go, you know, so he wouldn’t have to go alone. And Aziraphale had smiled, and nodded fondly, because he understood, and maybe he understood Crowley’s language all along but finally he was listening.

**Author's Note:**

> A slight reference to how Armageddidn't played out leans more toward book canon. Everything else should be fairly TV compliant.
> 
> xx [siliconealien](http://siliconealien.tumblr.com)


End file.
